Via America’s Lawyer: Corporations are using inflation as an excuse to widen their profit margins by jacking up prices. Mike Papantonio & Farron Cousins discuss more.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: Major corporations are using inflation as an excuse to jack up their prices and force consumers to pay even higher amounts for goods and services. As I look at this story, you know, we, you, you look at the empirical data. There is nothing in the empirical data whatsoever that says that these prices need to be jacked up. This is just another opportunity. The COVID, the transportation throughout the country, the, the, and now it’s inflation. And because of that, we have to jack up our price. This is one of the biggest lies that again, corporate media has not identified.
Farron Cousins: Right.
Mike Papantonio: The corporate media starts, they’re talking this story line for corporate America.
Farron Cousins: Right. Corporate media is only talking about, oh, supply chain. Here, the supply, nobody understands what any of that means, unless you take the time to dig into it. But what’s really happening, the two numbers we need to know about, prices are up for consumers 6%, 6.2%. Profits are up for big companies 37%.
Mike Papantonio: 37% since 1950, you look at it, it’s, it is a straight line, man.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. And the first two quarters of this year, while we’re still experiencing supply chain, corporations are doing better than ever, literally better than ever as consumers are paying more for everyday goods. You know, we’re paying more for milk. We’re paying more for, for new vehicles. We are paying more for everything across the board, lumber, new homes. And it’s, it is partially, obviously inflation and supply chain. Those are real things that are happening. But corporations always use this as an opportunity and they’ve admitted this in interviews, yes, we will raise our prices because when they come back down after the period of intense inflation.
Mike Papantonio: We will have made.
Farron Cousins: We’ll have made the adjustment.
Mike Papantonio: That’s right.
Farron Cousins: So it won’t go down to what it was.
Mike Papantonio: Exactly. It’s, it’s, it’s a new norm.
Farron Cousins: Yeah.
Mike Papantonio: It’s a new adjustment norm and this is what they look for in every crisis, whether it’s gasoline, any kind of supply chain issue this is exactly what. But if you look at the chart, it is a line straight up 37% increase for, for, for consumers since 1950.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. And, and look, the gas prices is a great example. Because when George W. Bush took office, gallon of gasoline national average, 97 cents, it peaked at $4 and 11 cents in his administration. We haven’t even hit that during this crisis. But then it never came back down. It was hovering in the twos and threes. We never got back to that dollar gallon gas because they hiked the prices.
Mike Papantonio: The new norm.
Farron Cousins: Because we’re used to it at that point.
Mike Papantonio: Yeah. It’s the new norm. We’re used to going to the, and paying it.
Farron Cousins: Yeah.
Mike Papantonio: And it’s happening with products across the board. Look, the corporate, corporate America is, this is because of social welfare. This is because of stimulus payments that have been made. That’s, that’s what their argument is. Really the best thing to come back with them is to say, you know what, okay, let’s find a new equilibrium. This will scare the hell outta corporate America. Let’s stop you from shipping jobs overseas. Let’s stop you for bringing in cheap, cheap labor across the border so you don’t have to pay ’em anything. That whole immigration issue, that’s what this is about. That’s why the Chamber of Commerce is all in on the immigration issue.
Farron Cousins: Yeah.
Mike Papantonio: Let’s, let’s do away with concepts of globalization like TPP, no more to discussion. We’re not gonna send anything to India. We’re not gonna send it to China. We’re gonna build a new equilibrium here in the United States to see how expensive is it really to build products and employ Americans right here on our own soil. That’s, that’s the first thing. The second thing is, you know, all these tax loops you got, they’re gone, baby.
Farron Cousins: Yeah.
Mike Papantonio: This offshoring it’s gone.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. You, you hate government handouts so much. How about we end our government handouts to you? No more subsidies, you know, which the oil industry alone is up to about 14 billion a year.
Mike Papantonio: Yes, yes.
Farron Cousins: You’ve got hundreds of billions hidden off offshore, another hundred billion more that lost in tax loopholes. Kill it all.
Mike Papantonio: That’s the response to this. But you know what?
Farron Cousins: You gotta have.
Mike Papantonio: Biden, you gotta have a president that’s willing to pull that trigger and I don’t think it’s, I don’t think it’s Biden on this. Farron Cousins, thank you for joining me. Okay.
Farron Cousins: Thank you.
Mike Papantonio: That’s all for tonight. Find us on Twitter and on Facebook @facebook.com/rtamericaslawyer. You can also stream us live on YouTube and be sure to check out RT’s new portable app, where you can watch all your favorite shows. I’m Mike Papantonio and this is America’s Lawyer where every week we tell you the stories that corporate media is ordered not to tell because their advertisers won’t let ’em and because their political involvement doesn’t allow for it. Have a great night.
